Luxury goods are said to have high income elasticity of demand: as people become wealthier, they will buy more and more of the luxury good. This also means, however, that should there be a decline in income its demand will drop. Income elasticity of demand is not constant with respect to income, and may change sign at different levels of income. That is to say, a luxury good may become a normal good or even an inferior good at different income levels, e.g. a wealthy person stops buying increasing numbers of luxury cars for his automobile collection to start collecting airplanes (at such an income level, the luxury car would become an inferior good).[citation needed]

Some luxury products have been claimed to be examples of Veblen goods, with a negative price elasticity of demand: for example, making a perfume more expensive can increase its perceived value as a luxury good to such an extent that sales can go up, rather than down.

Although the technical term luxury good is independent of the goods' quality, they are generally considered to be goods at the highest end of the market in terms of quality and price. Classic luxury goods include haute couture clothing, accessories, and luggage. Many markets have a luxury segment including, for example, automobile, wine, bottled water, tea, watches, jewelry, high fidelity, and chocolate.

Luxuries may be services. The hiring of full-time or live-in domestic servants is a luxury reflecting disparities of income. Some financial services, especially in some brokerage houses, can be considered luxury services by default because persons in lower-income brackets generally do not use them.

The three dominant trends in the global luxury goods market are globalization, consolidation, and diversification. Globalization is a result of the increased availability of these goods, additional luxury brands, and an increase in tourism. Consolidation involves the growth of big companies and ownership of brands across many segments of luxury products. Examples include LVMH, Richemont, and Kering, which dominate the market in areas ranging from luxury drinks to fashion and cosmetics. Leading global consumer companies, such as Procter & Gamble, are also attracted to the industry, due to the difficulty of making a profit in the mass consumer goods market.

The luxury goods market has been on an upward climb for many years. Apart from the setback caused by the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis, the industry has performed well, particularly in 2000. In that year, the world luxury goods market – which includes drinks, fashion, cosmetics, fragrances, watches, jewelry, luggage, handbags – was worth close to $170 billion and grew 7.9 percent.[1] The largest sector in this category was luxury drinks, including premium whisky, Champagne, Cognac. This sector was the only one that suffered a decline in value (-0.9 percent). The watches and jewelry section showed the strongest performance, growing in value by 23.3 percent, while the clothing and accessories section grew 11.6 percent between 1996 and 2000, to $32.8 billion. North America is the largest regional market for luxury goods; unlike the modest 2.9 percent growth experienced by the Western European market, the North American market achieved growth of just under 10 percent.[citation needed] The largest ten markets for luxury goods account for 83 percent of overall sales, and include Japan, China, United States, Russia, Germany, Italy, France, United Kingdom, Brazil, Spain, and Switzerland.[citation needed]

In 2012, China surpassed Japan as the world's largest luxury market.[2] China's luxury consumption accounts for over 25% of the global market.[3]The Economist Intelligence Unit published a report on the outlook for luxury goods in Asia, which explores the trends and forecasts for the luxury goods market across key markets in Asia. In 2014, the luxury sector is expected to grow over the next 10 years because of 440 million consumers spending "a total of 880 billion euros, or $1.2 trillion."[4]

With increasing "democratization",[5] several new product categories have been created within the luxury market, aptly called "accessible" or "mass luxury". These are meant specifically for the middle class (in this context, sometimes called the "aspiring class"). Because luxury has now diffused into the masses, defining the word has become difficult.[6]

Several manufactured products attain the status of "luxury goods" due to their design, quality, durability or performance that are remarkably superior to the comparable substitutes. Thus, virtually every category of goods available on the market today includes a subset of similar products whose "luxury" is marked by better-quality components and materials, solid construction, stylish appearance, increased durability, better performance, advanced features, and so on. As such, these luxury goods may retain or improve the basic functionality for which all items of a given category are originally designed.

A luxury brand or prestige brand is a brand for which a majority of its products are luxury goods. It may also include certain brands whose names are associated with luxury, high price, or high quality, though few, if any, of their goods are currently considered luxury goods.

For example, following a nearly crippling attempt to widely licence their brand in the 1970s and 1980s, the Gucci brand is now largely sold in directly-owned stores. The Burberry brand is generally considered to have diluted its brand image in the UK in the early 2000s by over-licensing its brand, thus reducing its cachet as a brand whose products were consumed only by the elite.

Unlike Burberry, English counterpart Barbour isn't as saturated in the retail market in terms of over-licensing; but bases its successes to global positioning in offering quality merchandise in directly-owned stores on four continents.

LVMH (Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy) is the largest luxury good producer in the world with over fifty brands, including Louis Vuitton, the brand with the world's first designer label. The LVMH group made a profit of €2 billion on sales of €12 billion in 2003. Other market leaders include Kering (after it purchased the Gucci Group) and Richemont.

A rather small group in comparison, the wealthy tend to be extremely influential. Once a brand gets an "endorsement" from members of this group, then the brand can be defined as a true "luxury" brand. An example of different product lines in the same brand is found in the automotive industry, with "entry-level" cars marketed to younger, less wealthy consumers, and higher-cost models for older and more wealthy consumers.

The advertising expenditure for the average luxury brand is 5-15 percent of sales revenue. This rises to about 25 percent with the inclusion of other communication such as public relations, events and sponsorships.[9]